The Overbearing Responsibility of Achievement: Life Saving Medal

I teach at the University of Brighton where I am the course leader for MA Sequential Design/Illustration and MA Arts & Design by Independent Project. I also supervise PhD students and teach a visual diary class to BA Art and Design students. I am originally from America but now live in London.

DAY RETURN TO BRIGHTON

'Day Return to Brighton' is an ongoing diary project of now over a thousand drawings on used train tickets from my daily commute from London to Brighton. When I started the series I set a few ground rules to help me remember what was important in the work. I limited the drawing materials to pencil, pen (black and blue ink only) and Tipp-Ex (white correction fluid), which keeps the project portable. I never throw tickets away: if I make a mistake I keep working on it until I'm left with something I like or can use, which might mean ending up with a virtually black ticket if things go badly wrong. For the most part I try to work with the mistakes, remembering that I'm allowed some less than wonderful tickets over the long haul. Also, every ticket used in the series must be mine, and only those used for my daily commute to Brighton. This reinforces my initial objective, which was to try to find a positive way to acknowledge the time and money invested in commuting. Each ticket represents one day of my working life.

VISUAL DIARY

Some pages in my diary are a real mess, but occasionally a door seems to open and something steps through, an idea or observation that sums up my day or a starting point for future work. I take my diary places I both do and don’t want to go.It helps me to get through meetings I’d rather not attend and keeps me company when visiting the dentist.I take it to restaurants in case I overhear anything interesting and on tiny adventures to coffee shops and museums.It’s also a favourite place to draw & paint while sitting in front of the TV.I enjoy the methodical approach to visual diary keeping; being able to turn the page to start again opens up the potential for new thinking.

BURDENS

I came across a painting in an auction catalogue a few years ago of a a young girl holding a package. In the painting the girl looked so sad and the package she held seemed less like a gift and more like a burden. I started thinking about burdens, what they mean and how we carry them - whether wrapped up like unwelcome gifts, worn like medals of achievement, or as heavy clouds that loom over us. This simple starting point continues to inform my work and has taken me from drawing to crochet.

CROCHET: MEDALS & CASUALS

I don't really know how to crochet but am gradually learning a few things as I go along. Nothing is really planned, as I am enjoying the surprise of not knowing what I'm making.

The Life Saving, Gymnast and Excellence award medals come from the idea that the need to succeed can be a burden. The date and time medals are about my personal history, and this work relates more to my visual diary work. The most recent 'Casuals' are a collection of dressed objects (dolls).